Is it a Car? Is it a Plane?
Damage caused by a vehicle or plane colliding with your home is generally covered by your homeowners’ insurance. While this seems like it must surely be a rare occurrence, car-into-building accidents happen up to 60 times every day, and cause 10 serious injuries each day across the United States, plus hundreds of thousands of dollars in property damage.
When It’s House vs. Humvee – Who Wins?
The Olympus Insurance Claims Team sees many claims where a vehicle has hit a home. Many of these collisions are the result of simple driver error – stepping on the gas instead of the brake or having the car in drive instead of reverse. While the vehicle may be partially or totally wrecked, in many cases the costliest damage is to the home.
Florida Vehicle / House Collisions
The OI Claims Team sees plenty of routine claims in which a car is accidentally driven into a residence, but some of the reported news stories from Florida based car/house collisions are rather extreme. December of 2017 was a particularly memorable month for vehicle-into-house accidents:
In mid-December, a man driving in Cocoa, FL, at about 2 o clock in the morning lost control of his Cadillac and drove it straight into a home through the wall of a children’s bedroom. Fortunately, the children escaped with only minor injuries.
A few days later, an Orange County woman was trapped under her dining room table when a car plowed through the house wall and pinned her to the floor. Rescuers had to pull cabinets from walls and battle a water main break to free her.
The very next week, another male driver lost control of his Jeep and drove it into a Pompano Beach home. The Jeep burst into flames and did so much damage to the house that it was completely uninhabitable and the residents had to vacate.
2018 has already seen its share of car vs. house collisions in Florida.
In January, a young man drove his car into Casselberry, FL, home after being shot at and fatally wounded.
In February, another man fled from police and crashed into the side of a home in Escambia County.
In March, a reckless driver reached speeds of 100 miles an hour before losing control of their Acura and slamming into the master bedroom of a St. Petersburg home, trapping a couple inside.
Perhaps the most startling story of all isn’t about a car, but a plane – in March of 2018, two siblings on a private flying lesson were injured after their small plane crashed into a house while trying to land at a small airport just 17 miles south of Daytona Beach. Fortunately, the brother and sister duo were not seriously injured, and the main damage to the home was to the carport.
How can you prevent damage to your home from a moving vehicle? There’s not a lot you can do about aircraft falling from the sky, but you can consider putting a sturdy wrought iron fence around your property or creating aesthetically pleasing barriers using trees or large boulders to provide some impediment to runaway vehicles.
-Via Olympus Insurance
2018
